Anomaly: Warzone Earth bound for Spring XBLA release

Backwards-tower-defense port gets redesigned joypad-friendly controls

11 Bit Studios has announced it'll be porting popular arcade-strategy title Anomaly: Warzone Earth to Xbox Live Arcade in Spring of next year. The game's backwards take on the well-worn tower-defense formula sees players in control not of resources or gun placements, but instead commanding the intruding vessel tasked with infiltrating the enemy's defenses.

Above: Trailer from the game's iOS launch

We were fans of both the computer and iOS versions of the title, praising the game's fresh take on a genre that's become crowded with underperformers in recent years. The rest of the Internet had the good sense to agree with us on this point, propelling the game's iOS version to a very respectable score of 94 on Metacritic – of which 11 Bit was justly proud.

The company promises it'll be rebuilding Warzone Earth's controls to optimize for joypad play; we were impressed at how well the studio handled the transition to touch control, so this new shift ought to be another interesting one. The conversion will also feature six exclusive Tactical Trials as well as the existing Story and Squad Assault modes. You can preview the game's PC debut with the demo available on the game's website.